A Note From the Editor: Lots of Great Things Are Happening Here

There’s a lot of great stuff going on here at Independent World Headquarters (i.e., my apartment in downtown Palm Springs).

For one thing: We’ll be launching our Supporters of the Independent Program within weeks. We don’t charge a thing for our great content, whether it’s delivered online, via email or in print—and we never will charge a thing for our great content. However, we understand that some readers would happily contribute a small amount of money to the Independent, be it monthly or annually, to help us do what we do. The Supporters of the Independent Program will help readers do just that—while receiving some cool perks in return.

We’re still setting things up and working out the details. Watch CVIndependent.com, as well as our weekly e-Edition, for those details.

For another thing: We’ll be opening up Round 1 voting for the Best of Coachella Valley 2015-2016 on Monday, Aug. 31. We’ll ask you, our readers, to share your top choices in 120 or so categories. We’ll compile the results, and then launch a second round of voting, starting in October, among the top vote-getters in each category. The winners of that poll will be honored and celebrated in our December print issue, and at CVIndependent.com in late November.

Finally … I have a little bragging to do.

The results of the Association of Alternative Newsmedia (AAN) 2015 Altweekly Awards were announced on Saturday, July 18, at the annual AAN conference, held this year in Salt Lake City, Utah—and the Independent was one of the papers honored.

While journalism awards are a dime a dozen, the Altweekly Awards, given out each year by AAN, are a fairly big deal. (As of now, this is the only journalism contest the Independent enters.) Seventy-one publications across the United States and Canada, almost all of which are bigger in terms of resources than the Independent, entered this year’s contest. In other words, there’s a lot of competition, so it’s quite an accomplishment to win one.

Congratulations to Brian on the award. Here’s hoping it’s the first of many awards for him—and the Independent as well. Heck, maybe he’ll win one for his most recent big story for the Independent, “In Defense of DHS,” which serves as our August print cover story. Who knows?